GB935823A - Improvements in or relating to vehicles for travelling over land and/or water - Google Patents

Abstract

935,823. Air cushion vehicles. HOVERCRAFT DEVELOPMENT Ltd. Sept. 24, 1959 [Sept. 1, 1958], No. 27976/58. Class 4. In a vehicle for travelling over land and/ or water and which is supported above the surface of the land and/or water by at least one cushion of pressurised gas formed beneath the vehicle and contained, at least in part, by a curtain of moving fluid, a fluid is caused to issue from the lower part of the vehicle to form the said curtain, at least part of the curtain forming fluid being recovered and used to form a further curtain and/or provide a part of the fluid forming the original curtain, injector means supplying energy to the recovered fluid or or part thereof, and supplementing the flow thereof. A plurality of embodiments are described which all employ single or multiple recovery systems, associated with injector nozzles. In Fig. 3 the main air curtain is expelled from a supply port 10 and enters inlet transfer port 11 passing through transfer duct 12 to re-issue through port 10. This flow is induced by the discharge of air from a plurality of discrete injector nozzles 15 supplied from a compressor 13. The nozzles may be arranged so that the vortex flows in the opposite direction or adjacent or spaced nozzles may be used to create two curtain systems, as in Fig. 9, wherein air from nozzle 40 energizes the flow from nozzle 41, which reenters at 42 to flow back to nozzle 41. The surplus air, generally equivalent to the air added by nozzle 40, enters inlet nozzle 44 and passes through duct 45 to a transfer port 46. A similar system operates outboard, energized by nozzle 47 and as shown the two vortex flows are spaced apart to enable an auxiliary vortex to form between them. Specifications 854,211, 919,350, 924,496 and 935,824 are referred to.